Dosso Dossi | Lucrezia Borgia, Duchess of Ferrara, 1518

Artist: Dosso Dossi (Italian High Renaissance painter, ca.1490-1542) (attributed to).

Date: 1518.

Medium: Oil on wood panel.

Dimensions: 74.5 × 57.2 cm.

Current location: Collezione: National Gallery of Victoria, Australia.

The recent (2008) identification of the subject of this painting as Lucrezia Borgia (1480-1519) answered a long-running mystery.

This portrait had previously been considered to be that of a young man. This is largely on account of the dagger which is held in the sitter’s hands and the belief that no single Italian Renaissance🎨 portrait of a woman ever showed the sitter holding a weapon.

However, certain aspects of the painting indicate that the sitter is indeed a woman.

Pino Daeni | Romantic painter

Pino Daeni (November 8, 1939 - May 25, 2010) was an Italian / American book illustrator and painter.

He is known for his style of feminine, romantic women and strong men painted with loose but accurate brushwork.

Considered one of the highest paid book illustrators of his time, he created over 3.000 book covers, movie posters and magazine illustrations.

Claude Monet: "Il piacere più nobile è la gioia della comprensione"!

"Seguo la Natura senza poterla cogliere... forse il fatto di essere diventato pittore lo devo ai fiori".

"I am following Nature without being able to grasp her... I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers".

"It took me time to understand my waterlilies. I had planted them for the pleasure of it; I grew them without ever thinking of painting them".

"Mi ci è voluto del tempo per capire le mie ninfee. Li avevo piantati per il piacere di farlo; Li ho coltivati senza mai pensare di dipingerli".

Benvenuto Tisi da Garofalo | High Renaissance painter

Benvenuto Garòfalo, byname of Benvenuto Tisi (1481-1559), Italian painter, one of the most prolific 16th-century painters of the Ferrarese school.

Garofalo’s first apprenticeship was with Domenico Panetti and later with the Cremonese painter Boccaccio Boccaccino.

Garofalo’s two visits to Rome in the first and second decades of the century greatly influenced his style, as did the work of Dosso Dossi, especially in the treatment of landscape backgrounds.

Peder Mork Mønsted | Snowy winter landscapes

Danish master Peder Mørk Mønsted (1859-1941) was best known for his ability to capture ‘types’ of landscapes, scenes of nature that embodied the essence of a country or region.

His favorite motifs include snowy winter landscapes, still water and forests.

He traveled throughout Europe, the Mediterranean, North Africa, and Middle East, painting such views, visiting Italy, France, Switzerland, Norway, Greece, Algiers and Egypt.

His most popular paintings, however, were scenes from Scandinavia, especially his native Denmark.

Hendrick van Steenwyck II | Baroque painter of architectural interiors

Hendrick van Steenwijk the Younger's (1580-1649) early style resembled that of his father, an architecture painter.

He likely spent several years in Antwerp, though he apparently was not enrolled in its painters' guild.

Van Steenwijk's architectural interiors of this period are frequently populated with figures by Jan Brueghel the Elder and other Flemish painters who worked in Antwerp.

Édouard Manet | Artworks and Quotes

Édouard Manet, (born January 23, 1832, Paris, France - died April 30, 1883, Paris), French painter who broke new ground by defying traditional techniques of representation and by choosing subjects from the events and circumstances of his own time.

His Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe (Luncheon on the Grass), exhibited in 1863 at the Salon des Refusés, aroused the hostility of critics and the enthusiasm of the young painters who later formed the nucleus of the Impressionist group.

His other notable works include Olympia (1863) and A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (1882).